The statements in this section merely provide background information related to the present disclosure and may or may not constitute prior art.
Some vehicle powertrains are designed to include a front mounted engine with a transmission located near the rear axle. For manual transmission applications, this design requires a linkage or connection between the driver controlled gear stick shift and the transmission. Additionally, the connection point of the stick shift and the transmission were offline or simply not a straight connection. In the past, a non-straight linkage or shift rod was utilized to transfer rotational and translational movement from the stick shift to the transmission. The shift rod was designed to compensate for the non-aligning connection with a twisted design requiring u-joints. While this worked well for its intended purpose, there are several shortcomings associated with the shift rod design. For example, the shift rod tended to twist upon itself instead of translating the rotational motion to the transmission. The torsional flexibility in the shift rod leads to increased shift effort for the driver and longer shift time. Therefore, there is room in the art for improved gear set shifter connection that reduce shift time, driver shift effort, and improved shift quality that translates into a better driving experience.